Monday 130819

Budweiser Is the Drink of Choice for People Who End Up in the ER

Beer and malt liquor were the most likely precursors for a hospital visit JULIE BECKAUG 16 2013, 9:00 AM ET

(schizoform/flickr)

The only reasonable explanation for drinking Budweiser is to get drunk. It’s certainly not for the taste. So it makes sense that in a pilot study of ER patients who’d been consuming alcohol, conducted by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, the number one brand they’d been guzzling was Budweiser,NBC News reports.

Budweiser holds 9.1 percent of the national beer market in the U.S., but 15 percent of the questionably desirable demographic of people who drink and then end up in the emergency room. Also a top contender in the ER market is Steel Reserve, which only holds 0.8 percent of the U.S. beer market, but a whopping 14.7 percent of alcohol-inclined ER patients.

The study is limited, of course, to the one small Baltimore hospital where the 105 patient interviews took place. (Sidebar: the survey takers wore white coats, which made patients more willing to talk—remember kids, not everyone in a white coat is a doctor)

Still, about one third of all ER visits involve alcohol in some way, and beer and malt liquor dominated in this particular study, so to improve your chances, perhaps reach for a refreshing glass of wine instead.